Patriots beat Dolphins 48-28 to hurt Miami hopes

The Dolphins were hoping to make a statement today. Unfortunately for them, the statement they made was that their defense wasn't up to the task of staying with Matt Cassell.

Matt Cassel.

The New England backup quarterback looked every bit as good as Tom Brady has looked in the past in leading New England to a 48-28 victory. Cassel completed 30 of 43 passes for 415 yards with three touchdowns and one interception.

When it was over, Cassel was celebrating with his receivers after New England's final TD with 37 seconds to play. For good reason, I guess. Randy Moss had eight catches for 125 yards and three TDs -- two of them caught against Jason Allen, the other against Andre' Goodman.

Wes Welker had eight catches for 120 yards.

The Patriots had 530 total yards. That is the most allowed by the Dolphins this season. The previous high was 485 yards allowed against Houston.

So the Dolphins didn't fight very well on defense although Channing Crowder got ejected for fighting. In fact, Crowder was ejected along with New England offensive tackle Matt Light.

The Miami offense had only modest success keeping the team in the game. Quarterback Chad Pennington completed 24 of 41for 341 yards. He also had three touchdown passes. Pennington did throw an interception that New England converted into a score.

Miami is now 6-5 and sinks to third place in the AFC East, tied with the 6-5 Buffalo Bills. The Jets are 8-3 and New England is 7-4.